Why Must These People Try My Patience?
by Tsuki No Shuurai
Summary: ....a series of Nanao-centric drabbles, some from Na-chan's POV, some from the POV's of others.
1. Fighting

**Fighting**

There was nothing quite like watching Nanao Ise fight.

She was sparring with Kiyone Kotetsu, easily blocking the other girl's attacks with sheathed zanpakuto. She had yet to draw her own weapon—she was fending Kiyone off with her hands, showing clearly her original Stealth Force training, sliding into each form with grace and flexibility.

She was music in motion.

However, it was when Kiyone yanked the sword from it's sheath with gritted teeth and charged her, that Nanao changed, instantly and dramatically.

She dodged the attack, yanking her glasses off her face as she did so and tucking them into her sleeves. Seconds later, her fan snapped out, the spikes on the ends elongating as her hair came undone, tumbling around her face, framing eyes that burned.

With life.

With freedom.

With savage joy.

Shunsui smiled and leaned back.

He had always had a thing for girls with expressive eyes.

**A/N—For Nanao. Because scary chicks in glasses rule!**

**Let's see….background music for this was Green Day's "Church on Sunday" and "She's a Rebel". Recognizable characters belong to Kubo Tite and Viz Media. I am only borrowing them for my own humble purposes XD Also, I have no idea whether Nanao used to be part of the Stealth Force or not—I was just playing around. **

**This is probably going to end up being a collection of Nanao-centric drabbles, not all of them set in the same universe. So stay tuned ;)**

**Please don't forget to review!**

**~E.J.**


	2. Sisters

**Sisters**

"Lisa-chan?"

"What is it, Nanao-chan?"

"Could we be sisters?"

Silence.

"Lisa-chan?"

Lisa's book slips from her nerveless fingers to the floor. Seconds later, it is back in her lap again, placed there by the knee-high girl gazing up at her through wire-framed glasses.

She summons a smile for her, and banishes that terrible night in the Rukongai from her thoughts.

"Of course, little onee-chan," she says with a grin that deepens when Nanao's face lights up with honest joy.

Because if Nanao needed someone to be her sister, then come hell or high water, she would be.

For the memory of a girl lost to the Rukongai ten years before.

**A/N—Lisa has so little backstory in the anime/manga, so I took liberties :D**

**Soundtrack included: Houki Boshi, Life is Like a Boat, and We. I don't own anything you can recognize.**


	3. Wrong

**Wrong**

She knew from the instant he left that something was wrong.

It was one of those steadily growing feelings, the same as the creeping doubt that had suffused her when Lisa had left on her "mission." When she had wanted to belive that she would come back, but knew by the time the sun rose the next morning that she wouldn't. When her captain's eyes had shown that he wanted to believe that too.

_Get a grip, _she told herself firmly. _He's probably just going out to get a drink or something. You only encourage him by getting like this._

But the dread was gnawing in the pit of her stomach now. She tried to ignore it, to continue to work, but after jumping at several small noises that proved inconsequential, she stood and left the library, eyes and ears open.

She found nothing.

Until twenty minutes later, that was, when she stumbled upon her taicho in a side alleyway, haori ripped and stained, blood seeping from his wounds.

Nanao remembered dropping to her knees beside him, remembered taking his rough, calloused hand in hers, remembered as if from a distance the rending scream that had brought the Fourth Sqaud running.

Later, she would refute all of the rumors about what had happened when Kyouraku-taicho had been hurt. Kiyone had shut up instantly about her crying in the halls when Nanao had given her a look during one SWA meeting. No one else dared to say anything.

And as long as no one—absolutely _no one_—knew that she stayed beside him that first night and hummed snatches of old lullabies softly under her breath, she was going to be all right.

She wouldn't have been if he had died.

If he had, she wasn't sure if she could ever fill the emptiness he would leave.

Because as much as he annoyed her….

….it felt so right, when he was there.

**A/N—Inspired by a few scenes in Diamond Dust Rebellion when Nanao seemed EXTREMELY concerned about her captain. Soundtrack: "Lifeline" by Papa Roach. "Jigouko Nagashi" from the Jogouko Shojou OST. "Mercede's Lullaby" from the Pan's Labyrinth OST. Nothing you recognize is owned by me. The only Bleach in my house is for laundry. *sad face* **


End file.
